THOSE who perceive Republicans as fuddy-duddies and those who think the Democrats are the life of the party are absolutely right.

Whether it be the glorious Jack Kennedy, the darling knockabout Lyndon Johnson, or the open-door policy of Bill Clinton, they’re right.

“When it comes to Judge Alito, whom I admire so much, I have to say he was never the life of the party,” says retired Judge Andrew Napolitano, who graduated from Princeton with Alito.

“Now when I was younger, I may have raged and ranted and introduced myself as a lawyer or a judge, big deal. But with Judge Alito, he would introduce himself to a stranger by saying, ‘Hi, I’m Sam.’ He administers justice in a straight and modest way, not provocative.”

John Nagle, a Notre Dame law professor who met Judge Alito when he was teaching law at Seton Hall in New Jersey and Alito was on the federal bench in Newark, had the same impression.

“A deep thinker but very modest,” said Prof. Nagle.

“Mainly, he talked about his kids, who were about the same age as mine at the time.”

The law professor and Judge Napolitano have tagged Alito as someone who’s square as a butter- box. But we want our judges to be squarer than us.

Point is, in my neighborhood we don’t know too much about this process. It is Beltway b.s.

But Judge Napolitano, pretty much the average guy himself, said, “When it came to partial-birth abortion, I believe Sandra Day O’Connor would’ve held for it. I also believe in his quiet way, Alito would not go along with that.”